


He is fragile

by kirtfromtheblock



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Blood, Dissociation, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Psychosis, Realistic depiction of mental illness, not self harm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-05
Updated: 2018-03-05
Packaged: 2019-03-27 10:43:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,542
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13879185
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kirtfromtheblock/pseuds/kirtfromtheblock
Summary: Hey i saw this comic ( http://alldavekat.tumblr.com/post/170504571571/please-can-we-get-a-kitkat-and-dave-smooch-a-cute ) and i really feel like dave wouldnt react this way so i rewrote it >:3cthis is the beginning of my psychosis series because when i go in homestuck and then psychosis its all like blood and murder and it doesnt have to be like that ok. hell no





	He is fragile

You're bored as hell and walking through the meteor aimlessly looking for shit to do when you cross the library rooms: namely, Karkat sitting a ways away in a beanbag-like seat squinting the fuck out of a beat up paperback that's probably definitely troll porn. Thank Skaia and all it's sburb bullshit that both your cultures were blessed with thrift stores loaded with sketchy, shittily written paperbacks that are three for a dollar. You definitely walk in. You feel in a good mood so you're most definitely up for bothering the shit out of your best bro.

And you can tell Karkat hasn't noticed you yet cause he hasn't twitched a little or shifted a tiny bit, kind of like how cats move one ear towards you when they notice you've walked into the room. It's totally prime time to fuck with him someway. You could tap him on one shoulder and pull that trick, but that's reserved for one situation and one situation only - when you tell your friends to wait in the food court while you and Ashley go into the hot topic for a couple minutes, and you come back and you tap your friend on the opposite shoulder and you all get to have a little fucking chortle for a second when they look the wrong way. And you're all fourteen. It's a shitty joke. In other words ..... very Egbertian.

You're gonna go for a head smooch then. It's not like you're gonna kiss him on his horns or some flirty shit or nothing, you're just gonna kiss him in his hair. It'd be really nice to kiss his fucking beautiful black curls so of course you're gonna go for it.   
For the moment you float around some bookshelves and feign interest, just gauging if Karkat really doesn't notice you with a few more footsteps, and then you move over to the back of his weird beanbag thing. You take a second to look at what he's reading. It'd be awkward if you startled him in the middle of some heated troll porn, huh? Awkward and funny. But also awkward. It looks like he's reading boring shit right now though. Karkat's eating it up like he always is: he squints down at the page and holds it close like he got fucking fisted in the face with a lemon, although you know most likely it's because he's shortsighted. You're never gonna tell him he's shortsighted. Likely, you feel like he'd be too self conscious to ever put glasses on his face.  
You think it's hilarious and awesome and kinda weird and funny that your best bro just reads porn out in the open and genuinely doesn't react to it. It's really like he's reading it critically for the plot and the writing. You know for certain that he is.

You take another moment to just glance through what he's reading. Some guy's arguing with another guy, it looks like. Just from the page spacing: you can't read fucking Alternian. It just looks like they're talking a fuckton cause you keep seeing quotations and shit. Anyway, fuck the book. Every moment you're being forced to read is a moment you need to steal back, for sure. Fuck that noise.  
You get to the head kiss. It's awesome. You smooch him on his head. He strikes up a loud snarl and turns around quickly: with his torso, and with his hand, bared and tensed and striking you lightning quick across your face.

In startling away from the red hot pain, you fall back on your butt. It feels like fucking fire and you cry out, you can't fucking help it. Your hand instinctually moves to cover your wounds and you feel hot and wet and red and dripping and it feels like several actual gashes and it fucking nauseates you. You draw your knees close and let out fucking petulant little cries and hide yourself between your knees and fist a hand into your hair. You're kind of like a wilting flower, like your limbs suddenly die and you can't feel them. You're saying fuck fuck fuck, and you only notice that someone else is too because you have an echo. "Fuck, fuck shit. I'm so sorry. Holy fuck, Dave. Dave. I'm so fucking sorry." is what you hear, once you focus. Your fucks dissolve into a whine.  
You can barely hear him. He's looking at you from over the back of his beanbag thing with wide concern, you know it, and then he you hear him get up to sit down beside you and help you. He rests a hand on your shoulder. "Dave, can you show me? Holy shit. Holy fuck, god damnit."

You don't comply because you can't because you feel like you're drowning. You're folded up tight, tight in a ball, hiding and breathing. You won't look but you can feel the hot blood dripping through your fingers and falling elsewhere to the floor or your pants or just wherever. It makes your stomach do flips and you heave out a sob. "Dave," he says, "you're okay. You're okay." He pats your shoulderblade. "Fuck."

Your head is hardly processing that you're fucking bleeding out from these deep ass wounds, you're gonna die, its like when a cat sees a cucumber and nopes the fuck out of there except your body is still sitting right here and your soul is off the fuck in space with the two rabid shitdogs out there.  
Like surfacing from water for a second, you manage to scrape up enough willpower just to move and hug Karkat because you fucking need him right now, fuck. He starts, but accepts your hug, and it feels good and you're thankful you have him here to nestle your face into the crook of his neck. You're thankful he's letting you soak his shirt in blood: the front and the back basically, because your mouth area is still dripping stinging and your right hand is fucking caked with blood too. You squeeze him tightly and let tears drip. His fever-heat feels really good. His hands are on your back and tentatively rubbing to keep you aware. "Okay. You're okay, Dave." he says and you can hear it alright.  
He still rubs your back to comfort you. "But I really need to clean your face off like as soon as possible Dave. I wish we had fucking medical cotton sheets on this meteor, or any first aid supplies in general basically. Somebody needs to alchemize some."

It's not like you're moving. You adjust your hands gripping into his shirt and pull yourself closer.  
"Anyfuckingway, I have sterilizer in my room. I can't have you dying of sepsis directly by my doing. If you died, I would die too, from the mere shock of failure on my part. Just from that, we'd have a 200% mortality rate and double the fucking incontinence. Or something. Who the fuck cares. God damnit."

You say "What?" and lift your face, valuing this closeness. Your voice is scratchy and quiet.

"Oh fucking hell, that's deeper than I thought." he says the moment he sees you, even in his peripherals. "I'm so sorry, holy fuck. Here." He lets go of you and moves briefly to stand up, and once he's standing, he looks down at you like he wants you to stand up too and when you meet his eyes he looks back at you expectantly. So you move to get up too. He bends down to help you get up which fucking makes your heart melt and you cry a little more, and the floor twists and shifts underneath you. "We're just gonna go to my room." he says, while supporting like half your weight.  
"I have wound cleaning shit in there." You would say you can do all that shit yourself you have more than enough experience, but that's not exactly true. If you took one look in a mirror right now you'd probably dry heave. So honestly Karkat might actually have to do this for you.

"Okay." you decide to agree although your voice is still scratchy and quiet like a seashell. He accepts your okay and holds out his hand, which you're thankful for too, because you don't know where the fuck you are right now. You guys have walked around the meteor holding hands before so this shit isn't anything weird. The only weird part might be that you're staring down at your shoes the whole time. It's too fucking dizzying to be watching the walls move as you walk.  
Whether or not you guys talk to Kanaya or Vriska on the way there, you have no clue, you can't hear anything. Karkat could have spoken to them, you trust him to tell them it was an accident and explain the situation without your input. At some points, your steps begin to falter or grow unsteady so he squeezes your hand and stops to look at you to watch, and you regain your focus just enough to keep walking even though you guys are going slow.

You and karkat have been dating for just a little while. The boyfriend title only came like two months ago. (one month and three weeks and five days and twelve hours and 23 24 25 26 seconds, actually.) but he's actually known since the start of your trip that you're fucking fragile and you'll crumple for the day if you're startled badly. Honestly, with Vriska around, there's just no conceivable way that fact could have stayed a secret for more than two weeks.

Terezi's always going tap-tap-tap wherever she goes, and Gamzee is always honking his fucking clown horns anyways, and Kanaya and Rose have been making an effort to make their footsteps just a tiny bit louder for your safety as well as close cabinets just a little noisier. Karkat's always fucking loud no matter what he's doing. Vriska actually hasn't changed anything: she isn't known to have much sympathy but it's still impossible for her to startle you anyways. So who gives a shit you guess.  
But of all the considering going on on this meteor, you didn't consider how Karkat might react to being startled. Of course it's perfectly safe to attack the moment you're startled. His whole culture is based off of defending yourself with violence. Why didn't you figure he'd fucking almost kill you? Dumbass. Christ.

Before you can think yourself any farther into the fucking ground you guys are getting to his room. "Here, sit." he says once he puts in the door code. You sit on his floor.  
He goes and picks up one of his dozens of black cotton 69 symbol shirts and starts pulling the fabric apart into strips.  
Fuck, not this shit again. You haven't actually told him about the 69 symbol yet. You hide a brief smirk behind your hand.  
"What the fuck is funny?" he says while watching you. You can't help but smile a little more and laugh breathy-silent into your fingers. He looks at you like you just punched him in the stomach. Now isn't the time to tell him about the 69 bullshit though because you'd have to explain it and you can't. It would have to be another time. "It's nothing man." you say.

"It'd better be good, Dave." he says and it makes you feel so fucking fluttery and nice. "No, it's good shit." you reassure him in a murmur that it isn't bad thoughts swirling in your head. "I'll tell you later." you tell him.  
He looks quizzically at you like he's considering either to let it slide or keep pressing you. Clearly, he chooses to let it pass because he grimaces down at the cotton strips in his hand and moves to sit in front of you.

You watch him as he moves, trying to ignore the tense, thin layer of dried blood on your face that makes your stomach unstoppingly want to turn over. You feel it mostly when you speak, how it stops your lips.   
He scoots closer to you and thoroughly licks a black square in his hand and leans in like he's gonna wipe you with it but you jerk away from him. "What the fuck?" you say. You know he can see your knitted eyebrows so he knows yo uwant an explanation. "It's not going to a kill you!" he says back in practically the same tone.

There's a moment of lag but you lean back in. You keep the incredulous ass expression though. He's wiping the excess blood off your face. It's all along your nose, cold and drying, and up on your cheeks too. "Spit has enzymes in it and shit like that." Karkat grumbles, mostly to himself.   
You tilt your head for a second like you don't get something, and then say, "How'd your planet have the word for enzymes?"

It's an unequivocal phrase for dropping the topic when you're both agreeing anyways, and it's fucking handy. That shit is a grand waste of time and there's no reason to waste time trying to think it out like Rose might. "Oh fuck that noise." Karkat says while concentrated. "There's no way in hell I'm going to spend a whole minute trying to reason that out."

When he finishes wiping your face off he scooches a little closer and decaptchalogues a dark glass bottle that you bet is medical alcohol. He uses a different, dry strip of cotton fabric and blots it with liquid, then leans in to start softly pat-wiping your deep cuts over your mouth, if you didn't immediately seethe through your teeth and jerk away again. "Ow, fuck!" you fall back on your hands. "Jesus christ, warn a guy!"

Karkat squints. "Do you humans make slithernoodle noises?"  
"No! I make ow that fucking stings noises because it fuckin stings!" You make like you want to itch it, but just make a fist instead cause it hurts. You know better.  
"Sorry Dave." he says and shrugs one of his shoulders. "I'll try to be fast with this."

He manages to get done with sanitizing your cuts in less than a minute but that doesn't stop you from pursing your mouth and clenching your teeth. "Fucking ow." you grumble, to which he responds with "I know." right away.

"Are you okay?" he says when he recaptchalogues the glass bottle. You give him a thoughtful 'mhm' and it seems like he's done helping you out so he looks to you expectantly: a silent 'now what'. You rub the back of your neck awkwardly. "Thanks for helping me out there. I could've done it, for real, but .. yeah, uhm."  
"I get it." Karkat says. You're still not exactly wordy yet like you usually are. "Nothing puts you out of the mood to patch yourself up like being injured yourself."

"Yeah."  
You aren't sure what to say right now. To be honest, you really don't feel very verbal. "Do you want to watch a movie?" Karkat offers. He's trying to save you and you freaking love him. Your mouth stings a little.   
"Yeah man. But hold up. Are you aware your shirt has a sixty nine on it?"


End file.
